Netflix expands its India content slate with 8 new original films & an original series

Among the new original films commissioned by Netflix include three films produced by Bollywood actors Priyanka Chopra, Anushka Sharma and Madhuri DixitVikas SN | ETtech | November 09, 2018, 13:28 IST

Netflix is expanding its India slate of original content by announcing eight new original films and a new original series as the company looks to attract more International subscribers.

"We celebrate India today with an incredible line-up of original films and series that are right now filming across India. This line-up cuts across genres from horror to fantasy and in locations from Leh to Mumbai." said Ted Sarandos, Chief Content Officer, Netflix.

The new original series, called 'Typewriter', is about a haunted house and a haunted book that stir the imagination of a group of young, wannabe ghost hunters. It will be directed by prominent film maker Sujoy Ghosh.

With this, Netflix has commissioned around 12 original series in India, of which two of them, Sacred Games and Ghoul, have been released so far and the third one, Selection Day, is set to debut in December this year. This is the largest investment the company has made to date in local original programming.

Among the new films, Netflix has commissioned a film on the Indian startup ecosystem called Upstarts. The Hindi original film is about three small-town college graduates who are captivated by the country's startup boom and enter the "rollercoaster startup ecosystem of big dreams, big money and bigger sharks" the company said adding that it is supported by real-life personalities from the Bengaluru startup ecosystem.

Apart from this, the streaming giant has commissioned three films produced by Bollywood actors - Firebrand (a Marathi film produced by Bollywood actor Priyanka Chopra), Bulbul (a Hindi period film produced by actor Anushka Sharma and Karnesh Sharma’s Clean Slate Films) and 15th August (a Marathi film produced by actor Madhuri Dixit).

Other films announced include Cobalt Blue, Chopsticks, Music Teacher and Hotel Mumbai (SAARC region only). Netflix has released around four original films in India until now, including Brahman Naman, Love Pe Square Foot, Lust Stories and Brij Mohan Amar Rahe.

As ETtech reported earlier, India has turned out to be a lucrative content hub for the streaming giant which plans to spend more than $8 billion on original programming this year.

These original series has helped them grow awareness of the service in India, Sarandos had said in the company's earnings interview last month.

"What it really was able to do was take this product that maybe was less known in India, when we launched and make it feel more local, more relevant. What we saw was all of that was following a nice steady increase in viewer engagement prior to us launching those big original shows" Sarandos said.

Apart from India, these original shows and films has also performed well in other markets for the video streaming firm.

Yesterday, Netflix vice president of product Todd Yellin revealed at a company event in Singapore that two of the three viewers for its first original series 'Sacred Games' were from outside India.

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